Welcome to City-Data.com Forum!
U.S. CitiesCity-Data Forum Index
Go Back   City-Data Forum > General Forums > Relationships
 [Register]
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
View detailed profile (Advanced) or search
site with Google Custom Search

Search Forums  (Advanced)
View Poll Results: Can men and women be real friends?
Yes 43 75.44%
No 14 24.56%
Voters: 57. You may not vote on this poll

Reply Start New Thread
 
Old 04-30-2013, 05:47 PM
 
Location: Florida
2,289 posts, read 5,755,168 times
Reputation: 5279

Advertisements

I am a white women, I have a male friend who is black. We have been friends for 44 years. We met at work, he was married as was I. We all socialized, my husband died 14 years later, he divorced somewhere along the line. I remarried several years later, we socialized, me, my husband, him and his girlfriend (he never remarried).

My second husband died 7 years ago. Although, we live in different states we keep in touch and visit each other every few years. No hanky panky ever...we are just friends. So, in our case, it works.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message

 
Old 04-30-2013, 05:49 PM
 
Location: Where the sun always shines
2,170 posts, read 3,290,778 times
Reputation: 4501
Quote:
Originally Posted by Scottay View Post
I've got 4 good female friends right now. All single, 3 of them hot. The non-hot one has a crush on me and so far just being friends has worked out, although I am getting sick of her propositioning me. The other three dont seem attracted to me and anyways, I dont really want any right now.
Key words "right now", meaning you're open to it later under different circumstances or if the drinks are flying. And if the other keeps propositioning, shes not a friend, she has plans for you
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 04-30-2013, 05:56 PM
 
4,699 posts, read 4,043,478 times
Reputation: 2483
Well, just because they are attracted to each other does not mean they can't be friends. Don't people have self restraint?

Sure you might have been romantically involved if the situation was different, but it is not. You have a girlfriend/wife, they have a boyfriend/husband, you are not compatible, she is very religious and you are not. In that case you can be friends as you can't date but you like each others company.

Maybe it is better to say it in this way. Females and males can't be best friends, but they can be friends.

Last edited by Camlon; 04-30-2013 at 06:05 PM..
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 04-30-2013, 06:06 PM
 
14,376 posts, read 18,275,393 times
Reputation: 43042
I have lots of male friends. And yes, I believe there can be friendship where there is also attraction at some point.

One of my guy friends had a crush on me, but we were not "couple" material and I did not take him up on his overtures because a fling with him would have been disastrous to our circle of friends. Years later, after he had married a woman who is his perfect match, we had a conversation where he obliquely thanked me for having the good sense not to go there with him. I think I had that good sense, because I had already been in really deep and passionate love with someone and he hadn't yet, and I knew the makings of it just weren't there with my friend. Then he found it with the woman who is now his wife, and he understood my POV on the subject.

And the guy I consider the love of my life, had a small crush on my best friend. That did not keep him from maintaining appropriate boundaries or a good friendship with her. He acknowledged the attraction and that it wasn't something he would act on, and moved on from there. As he put it, I was the better match for him but it was kind of a relief that he didn't meet her first, because he'd have chased after her and thereby lost any chance at me. And I always knew that much of the reason he was attracted to her was because she was a lot like me in many ways.

In the circle of 20 or so male and female friends (most are now married) my cousin has had since high school, attractions are openly acknowledged and never acted upon if they are between people already in committed relationships with other parties. It's funny - they are just an average bunch of people, but they have this insane level of emotional intelligence when they're in a group (which is really strange because usually "groupthink" makes people dumber). Over the past 20 years, I've watched them all get completely ****-faced drunk together and no one has ever so much as laid an inappropriate hand on someone else's shoulder. But just one illicit relationship between two members of this group would bring down an entire social network that they have built over decades, so everyone observes the boundaries very carefully. I think part of it is that many of them come from broken homes and dysfunctional families, so this group of friends is kind of a refuge - I think some of them are more invested in this overall group than in their actual marriages, in some ways. It's really fascinating, actually. And I'm not saying there's no cheating - but there's no cheating within the group of friends.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 04-30-2013, 06:06 PM
 
Location: The Valley of the Sun
1,479 posts, read 2,708,701 times
Reputation: 1534
Quote:
Originally Posted by jacktravern View Post
Key words "right now", meaning you're open to it later under different circumstances or if the drinks are flying.
If certain circumstances were different then yes, I'd definitely like to have any one of the three as my girlfriend. But I am ok with them just being my friends and I have not made a pass at any of them. I like their personalities enough to be able to be just friends and I don't want to jeopardize my friendship with them by letting it go any further.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 04-30-2013, 07:51 PM
 
Location: Armsanta Sorad
5,648 posts, read 8,026,717 times
Reputation: 2462
No, never.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 05-01-2013, 12:17 PM
 
Location: Chicago area
18,750 posts, read 11,719,220 times
Reputation: 64084
Is a woman physically attracted to every man she meets? Is a man physically attracted to every woman he meets? No of course not. So yes it's possible to be friends with the opposite sex. How boring life would be if we couldn't have those friendships.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 05-01-2013, 12:27 PM
 
Location: NYC
2,427 posts, read 3,971,525 times
Reputation: 2299
why can't you simultaneously be attracted to someone and be their friend?

you can't pursue someone and be their friend, but pursuit and attraction are two totally separate things

if i couldn't separate my sexual drives from how i treat someone, there'd be lots of women i simply couldn't interact with in an appropriate way, whatsoever

it sounds to me like what you are really asking is, can a guy be platonic friends with a woman he is attracted to with and actively wants to sleep with? of course, the answer to that is no

perhaps you don't realize just how quickly and easily a man can be physically attracted to a woman
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 05-01-2013, 05:33 PM
 
Location: Chicago IL
1,360 posts, read 1,688,083 times
Reputation: 1295
Yeah women and men can be friends. Its very easy on a base level for me I mean I met people and I became friends with them those friends just happen to of the opposite sex than me go figure.

Attraction is just a different variable and it depends its not really that universal.
.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 05-01-2013, 07:20 PM
 
Location: Baltimore, MD
11,325 posts, read 9,210,126 times
Reputation: 52459
Quote:
Originally Posted by DiscombobulateYa View Post
Yep!...I get cast to the friends zone all the time.
That only happened to me once, many years ago.

The attraction was too strong on my end to make it work. I felt it was pointless. I had a lot more in common with my friends.

The answer to the question in the topic is yes. But I think it's rare.

srjth - That clip is so fitting. Never saw the movie. Thanks for posting it.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.

Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.


Reply
Please update this thread with any new information or opinions. This open thread is still read by thousands of people, so we encourage all additional points of view.

Quick Reply
Message:


Over $104,000 in prizes was already given out to active posters on our forum and additional giveaways are planned!

Go Back   City-Data Forum > General Forums > Relationships

All times are GMT -6.

© 2005-2024, Advameg, Inc. · Please obey Forum Rules · Terms of Use and Privacy Policy · Bug Bounty

City-Data.com - Contact Us - Archive 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37 - Top